West Ridge

      Prayer Points

• Many residents of West Ridge hold to Muslim, Hindu, and Jewish beliefs. Pray that residents from these backgrounds would come to know Christ and that the Church would see this as a missional opportunity to strategically access many of the nations who have come to Chicago.

• Patterns of spiritual darkness and strongholds cling to West Ridge. There are several bookstores and propaganda that display alternative beliefs and apologetics to talk Christians out of their faith. Pray for the tearing down of these of strongholds and for Christians to stand firm in love.

• Many ministries are using creative ways to reach out to the community with cross-cultural evangelism especially with tutoring children, teaching English, and showing the Jesus film. Praise God for these ministries and pray for continued strength for the people serving.

      Ethnic Breakdown

• Asian (20.6%)
• Black or African American (10.3%)
• Hispanic or Latino (19.0%)
• White (47.3%)

Neighborhood Background

West Ridge remained relatively rural for most of the nineteenth century, not experiencing accelerated population growth until after 1920. West Ridge continued to grow steadily during the 1930s.

The increasing population resulted in more housing units with the building of larger multiunit structures. After the end of World War II and a final population surge, the population of West Ridge began to level off by the 1970s. Since then West Ridge has become a popular destination for many ethnic groups, such as Jews, Middle Easterners, Indians, Pakistanis, and Koreans.

Approximately forty-six percent of the current 72,000 people living in West Ridge were not native born. The area is home to Devon Ave, also popularly known as “Little India”.